


Two Ways Home

by andchaos



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-13
Updated: 2013-11-13
Packaged: 2018-01-01 08:53:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1042888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andchaos/pseuds/andchaos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>9x06 coda  between that night and the next morning, after Castiel says goodnight to Nora and before Dean leaves in the morning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Two Ways Home

**Author's Note:**

> It was supposed to be mildly sexual with a hint of angst, but it turned out to be quite angsty with hints of sex, so...sorry. If you're looking for a sexual fic, this is the wrong place, as they don't even kiss. The timing didn't seem right. At least Castiel finally gets the big I'm A Worthless Human breakdown we've been waiting for.

“Where to, Cas?”

          Castiel stared at him across the car, blank-eyed and stoic as ever. He blinked once, his injured hand clenching unconsciously on the door handle, and then mutely pulled and slid into the passenger’s seat. Dean watched the place his friend had been for a few more seconds, then nodded to himself and climbed into the driver’s side. Wordless as his companion, and almost matching him for calm demeanor (though Castiel’s head was probably screaming way louder than Dean’s, for once), he pulled out properly onto the street.

          “I know a place,” said Dean quietly, and Castiel reached forward immediately to turn on the radio. It was Dean’s favorite station, of course, but neither complained.

          Dean desperately wanted to make some kind of addendum to his statement—Castiel obviously didn’t want to talk but he felt he needed to do a better job at helping him than “I know a place.” He wanted to say, _I’ve got you_. He wanted to say, _We’re going home_.

          He pulled into the motel parking lot not ten minutes later, sliding smoothly into the space right in front of his room. They both got out of the car, still not speaking. Cas barely glanced at him as he walked around the front of the Impala, falling into step behind Dean, though that little look seemed to say _Thank you_. Or maybe he was actually saying _What the actual fuck, Dean Winchester?_ and Dean was just really bad at reading body language.

          However, that one glance seemed to be the floodgate; Dean could feel Castiel’s eyes boring into the back of his head as he fumbled with the door key, flipping it over and back again at least three times before the light above the handle turned green. Dean pushed inside without looking back, suddenly _over_ conscious of the way Castiel was staring at him, but the other man followed too closely, bumping into his back a few times as they both tried to get over the threshold as quickly as possible. Castiel didn’t want to say it, but he felt like a little kid, rushing to cross into a safely sealed off space before the monsters in the dark could catch him with his back turned. Dean already thought he was little more than useless.

          Miraculously, Dean didn’t say anything about this strange scuffle as he crossed the room to the single bed, which was wide, but you know, still just _one bed_. Castiel glanced around the little room, rooted to the spot with his back pressed to the closed door.

          “I’ll take the floor,” he said suddenly, the first words he’d spoken since he’d bid goodnight to Nora. “Let me just…wash myself first. I can no longer…”

          “Don’t worry about it, Cas,” said Dean quickly, and he meant that he’d gladly take the carpet, but Castiel didn’t understand. He nodded jerkily and shuffled into the tiny bathroom. He twisted the knob to the shower and snorted. Obviously, Dean chose the motel with the best water pressure.

          By the time Castiel was finished—and as he was taking his showers in the locker room of a local gym nowadays, he was fairly adept at moving through the process quickly—Dean had shucked his jeans and swapped his t-shirt. He was padding around the room in his socks, trying to find the softest spot to curl up on.

          “Between the lamp and the window,” said Castiel automatically, noticing immediately what Dean was doing. Dean looked up. Castiel cleared his throat. “That’ll be most comfortable for me. I’m used to—I mean, I’m good at—” _I’ve had to do this a few times._ Dean’s stomach sank, because yeah, he’d kicked the guy out.

          “Thanks,” he said, and crossed the room instantly, sinking to the floor. He looked pathetic and more than a little silly, cross-legged in the cramped space next to the bedside table, and once Castiel realized what Dean was doing, he even cracked a smile.

          “Neither of us is going to let the other sleep on the floor, are they?”

          Dean grinned. “Probably not.”

          Which left one option, only it wasn’t weird. Dean lay underneath the sheets and Castiel placed himself on top, refusing to alter his position even when Dean prodded him and complained that he was trying to make himself uncomfortable again for Dean’s sake.

          Castiel blinked down at him where his head was resting on the mattress (he’d refused point-blank to take the only pillow). “We should…compromise, right?”

          Dean shrugged. “It’d be the _human_ thing to do.” His voice was only barely teasing, a tone that Castiel did not catch. He nodded seriously and leaned forward, shuffled the pillow over so that Dean could lay on it too, and slipped underneath the covers. He watched Dean carefully, trying to figure out if things were finally acceptable.

          Dean was studying the ceiling pointedly. When he could still feel Castiel’s eyes on his profile after a full minute, he snorted. “Stop staring at me, Cas. I feel like I’m at a fuckin’ sleepover.”

          Castiel turned obligingly on his side, facing away from the hunter. “Goodnight, Dean,” he said quietly, reaching over to flip out the lights.

          “’Night, Cas,” came the gruff reply in the sudden darkness.

          They both lay there for a few moments, completely still. The night was too quiet, too piercing. It seemed to them both that if either shifted even the slightest bit, this thin glass of reality would somehow shatter, leaving them to pick up even more pieces.

          “Dean?” Castiel ventured after a five minutes of lying there rigidly. He turned to face the ceiling, and a glance to his right showed only Dean’s back, but he was evidently awake, as he grunted in reply.

           “Can you…” He choked off, voice catching on the second word, and he heard noises beside him; Dean was turning over immediately, the sheets rustling, bed creaking, as he sidled closer. One hand ghosted over Cas’s arm as the fallen angel gasped out, “Can you stay with me?”

          This seemed a stupidly obvious request; they were already sharing a bed, for fuck’s sake, how much less alone could he possibly want to be?

          Dean seemed to understand though. He breathed out near-silent assent and roughened the grip on Castiel’s arm, tugging; Castiel rolled to face him and pressed closer, squinting to see him in the dark, to make sure that he was still solidly there, whole and _real_.

          “You okay?”

          Castiel shook his head frantically and groped outwards, seeking contact; his hands connected, one closing on a shoulder where the other found a hip, and he pulled the hunter to him. Hugging was really fucking awkward from this angle, but he didn’t care. Dean wrapped his arms around his shaking friend, hard and unyielding, and Cas buried his face in Dean’s collarbone. For a very long time, the only sounds in the room were the ragged noises coming from his mouth, muffled by the cotton of Dean’s grey t-shirt and quickened every time Dean’s grip relaxed even remotely.

          He quieted slightly after a time, and only then did he notice Dean’s cheek pressing into his hair. He huddled closer as Dean’s arms finally relaxed, still embracing him, but loosely.

          “I—”

          One of Dean’s hands was rubbing his back, the other fisted into the bottom of his worn blue button-down. “What?” he murmured, mouth already close to his ear.

          Castiel’s words were much softer than his sobs, and even more quiet than Dean’s when he had muttered the same ones, a lifetime ago, quavering and plaintive and solemn. Castiel’s were almost pleading as he reflected them back, a question and a statement, directed toward the only being he had ever found solace in, even when they were screaming and glaring and beating each other up.

          “I—I need you.”

          Dean’s grip tightened convulsively again, pressing into the toned muscles of his back. “Me too, buddy. Just…go to sleep.”

          He did then, finally, hands still closed over fabric and skin, pressed into the chest of his best friend, the same person he found his way home to, every time.

 

“I’m proud of you,” Dean says in the morning, and Castiel wants to thank him—maybe for the sentiment, maybe for last night, he doesn’t know—but he doesn’t. He won’t press, he won’t break down. He’s worth something for now. Like making taquitos. Nachos too, sometimes.

          He climbs out of the Impala and shuts the door, turning to say goodbye through the window. His eyes stretch wide and pleading, and he wants to say something else, something like _Are you sure?_ or something like _Take me home_ , but he doesn’t. He turns to unlock the shop, and he can feel Dean’s eyes on him as he walks in and shuts the door behind him. He wants to feel as normal, as at peace and _purposeful_ as he had twenty-four hours ago. He wants to feel at home here, but he can’t. There are two ways home for him—and one just drove off to find the other.


End file.
